Making Room for Transformative Teaching

Posted September 14, 2015

Artist’s rendering of new
classroom space

When the Texas A&M College of Veterinary Medicine &
Biomedical Sciences moves into its new complex in 2016, the space
will be larger, modern, and full of light. More importantly, it
will fundamentally change the way professors teach and students
learn. The new facilities will foster learning rather than
constraining it.

“We spend a lot of time and energy trying to work around our
facilities right now,” said Dr. Shannon Washburn, who teaches
physiology courses. “Now we’ll have the freedom to think how we can
use our facilities instead of having to work around them.”

Washburn also mentioned that those little distractions that can
impede learning—such as poor lighting and acoustics, unpredictable
temperature, and uncomfortable seats—will all be greatly alleviated
in the new building. “Every little thing that we can do to make
learning easier for the students is good,” she said.

Classroom Layout and Space

The classrooms intended for lectures will each be large enough
to comfortably accommodate a class of 250 people and their laptop
computers which is especially important as more and more classes
move to computerized testing.

The classrooms also will have a flexible layout. Several
professors mentioned their excitement about this aspect. Dr.
Virginia Fajt, who currently teaches a lecture-based pharmacology
course in a classroom with stadium seating, said that the aisles
keep students from interacting with each other and with her. In the
new classrooms, she can arrange the seating without aisles—or in
any other configuration that suits her.

Washburn agreed that it can be challenging to engage with
students when teaching a large class in traditional lecture-style
seats. “You’re standing up there talking,” she said. “We want to
teach, not just talk.”

“The possibilities that exist in the new building include the
option to include more collaborative and team-based approaches to
teaching in a classroom,” Fajt continued. “The new building is
going to really let us do that because some of the physical spaces
are different from what we have now.”

Those physical spaces include collapsible seating in which the
lecture-type seats can be folded up into the wall with the touch of
a button. Chairs and tables can then be brought out of the
adjoining closet and arranged in clusters for small group
discussion, with room for the instructor to walk around and
interact with each group. This sort of peer-topeer learning is
extremely useful for helping students engage with the material and
with each other. “And the more they engage, the better they learn,”
Washburn said.

Fajt agreed that the new approaches help focus the educational
process on the students themselves. “Instead of talking about
teaching,” she sad, “we’re talking about learning.”

Artist’s rendering of new
classroom space

Lab Time and Space

Space for small groups to gather will be available during
laboratory time as well.

“That will give the basic science instructors, myself included,
the ability to do more small group discussion and more case
studies, where it’s not practical to do it in the big laboratories
right now,” said Dr. Anton Hoffman, who teaches anatomy. “It’s
definitely preparatory for their transition into third and fourth
year, where they’re always working in small groups as they’re on
their rotations.”

The teaching laboratories themselves will be larger, with room
for 100 students. This would allow for future growth for decades to
come. Currently there are two lab sections, but the students in
each section are in two adjoining rooms, and the instructor must
run back and forth between them. The new building will have labs
large enough for all of the students in a section to be together,
which will allow for more student engagement with their classmates
and interaction with the instructor.

For Dr. Tamy Frank-Cannon, who also teaches anatomy, a major
advantage will be storage space. In the current building, she moves
anatomic models into the laboratories to show the students and then
moves them out again after the class or lab time is over. There is
no designated space to store the items for the next time they’re
needed. “We see what’s happened to my office here,” she said,
gesturing to the models scattered on every spare surface of the
room.

Dr. Louise Abbott, whose teaching includes large-animal gross
anatomy, is also excited about the increased storage capacity.
“What we currently have now is really haphazard,” she said. “We
have stuff stored wherever we can fit it, and it’s often very
inaccessible.”

The new building has storage and other support facilities built
specifically for each major teaching lab. The storage
space will allow for more efficient use of class time. “Now the
students have to go get their microscopes, bring them to the table,
get them set up, get them plugged in, and get everything
organized,” Hoffman said. In the new building, he said, the
microscopes will be on a hidden rail system, so they can slide into
place for use.

Model dog with
bladder

Using Models

In the new building, Frank-Cannon looks forward to more use of
models on which students can practice clinical procedures. She
currently is reengineering a stuffed animal for this purpose.
“Right now, he’s just got stuffing and a fake bladder in him,” she
said. “What I want to do is put in other organs, so that the
students have to try to sort out what they’re feeling to make sure
that they’ve actually got bladder before they actually shove the
needle into them.”

Frank-Cannon uses different types of silicone to simulate
muscles, bones, skin, and other organs. She said the process
entails a good deal of trial and error as she tries to make each
model anatomically correct. “There are a number of drafts involved,
as you go step-by-step, trying to get the feel as close to the real
thing as you can,” Frank-Cannon said. “For me, I take all of my
anatomy skills and try to incorporate that into the models.”

“With the new building, one of the things that’s going to be
really nice is dedicated space, or a space that’s really set up for
this type of teaching,” Frank-Cannon continued. “Right now, we’re
just making do with where we can find things to fit.”

Both Frank-Cannon and Abbott are excited about having a lab in
the new building where they can make plastinated models. In these
models, the tissue in specimens is replaced with polymers,
resulting in long-lasting versions to use for study. “They get used
after a number of years, and they eventually fall apart because the
students handle them so much,” Abbott said. “We need to replace
specimens, and we need to add specimens. That’s something that’s
going to be very useful in this new building that we really don’t
have the capability of doing right now.”

The new building will also allow students to study and practice
on both plastinated and silicone models outside of class time, for
which there isn’t currently space. “Right now, students have access
when I bring them to use in teaching,”

Frank-Cannon said. “They don’t have access to practice or study
or doing anything outside of class.” She said she hopes that in the
dedicated space in the new building, the students can use the
models outside of class time and perhaps even check them out to
take home.

Abbott agreed that it would be extremely helpful for students to
use the models outside of the official class or laboratory
sessions. “I know in small animal [anatomy] they get a box of bones
they can carry around with them, but they don’t have that
capability in large animal because the bones are too big,” she
said. “They have to actually do their studying from the specimens
that are in the laboratory. Again, I think having good models they
can take home will allow them a lot more flexibility for accessing
information.”

Using Electronic Technology

Instructors are also excited about other planned technology in
the new classrooms and labs. Better computers and
projection systems will allow for more multi-media use in
lectures, which professors agree will facilitate demonstrating
dynamic processes in real time. Some are also excited about the
ability to expand digital testing capabilities, especially for
laboratory portions of an exam.

Labs themselves will have more technology as well. “Right now in
our current anatomy lab, if you need to make an announcement or
talk to the students, you’re yelling,” Hoffman said. “There’s no
microphone, there’s no PA.” The new labs, however, will have
built-in sound systems. The labs will also have monitors scattered
at the various workstations so that students can access
information.

Those screens will also be able to project images from a mobile
camera planned for the anatomy lab. “If we see something really
awesome, it’s just going to be a matter of wheeling the camera over
and saying to the students, ‘Hey, take a look at your monitors,’
and in two or three minutes, everybody gets it at the same time,”
Hoffman continued. “It’s going to be a much more efficient use of
laboratory time than it is now.”

Abbott looks forward to the anatomy labs’ having tablet
computers on which students can consult dissection guides and
access other information while they’re working with specimens. “I
see that as sort of an adjunct to the computer screens that will be
there,” she said.

Room to Dream

The professors also recognize that the space’s flexibility will
give them options that they haven’t even considered yet, especially
as they start to work in the new building and discover its
capacities. “We’re now going to have the freedom to try new
things,” Washburn said.

Fajt finds that the new building has served as an impetus for
discussions among professors about new ideas and possibilities.
“It’s on everyone’s mind, how we can improve,” she said.

Hoffman is excited about how he can put his teaching ideas into
practice in the new building, without being confined by the
physical space. “Being here 25-plus years, you get to the point
where you get a little stifled,” Hoffman said. “In the new
building, I think we’re going to be able to dream, to imagine new
ways of doing things. It’s like I can do whatever I want now. I’m
looking forward to it.”